True Believer

"Okay, how's this?" Nate was going on. "We open with the legend itself, sort of setting the scene. Misty cemetery, a close-up on some of the graves, maybe a quick shot of a black raven looking ominous, you talking in voice-over . . ."

The man was the master of Hollywood cliches, and Jeremy glanced at the clock again, thinking it was way too early for this.

"I'm tired, Nate. How about this? You think about it and let me know later, okay?"

"Yeah, yeah. I can do that. That's what I'm here for, right? To make your life easier. Hey, do you think I should call Alvin?"

"I'm not sure yet. Let me see the tapes first, and then I'll talk to Alvin, and we'll see what he thinks."

"Right," he said, his voice rising in enthusiasm. "Good plan, good idea! And this is great news! A genuine ghost story! They're going to love this! I told you they were hot and heavy about the idea, didn't I? Believe me, I told them you'd come through with this story and that you wouldn't be interested in talking about the latest diet fad. But now that we have a bargaining chip, they're going to go crazy. I can't wait to tell them, and listen, I'll be calling you in just a couple of hours, so make sure you keep your phone on. Things could be moving quickly . . ."

"Good-bye, Nate. I'll talk to you later."

Jeremy rolled back onto the bed and pulled the pillow over his head, but finding it impossible to fall back to sleep, he groaned as he got up and made his way to the bathroom, doing his best to ignore the stuffed creatures that seemed to be watching his every move. Still, he was getting used to them, and as he undressed, he hung his towel on the outstretched paws of a badger, thinking he might as well take advantage of the animal's convenient pose.

Hopping into the shower, he turned the water as far as it would go and stayed under the single jet for twenty minutes, until his skin was pruned. Only then did he begin to feel alive again. Sleeping less than two hours would do that to a person.

After throwing on his jeans, he grabbed the tapes and got in his car. The fog hung over the road like evaporating dry ice on a concert stage, and the sky had the same ugly tones as it had the day before, making him suspect that the lights would appear again tonight, which not only boded well for the tourists this weekend but also meant that he should probably call Alvin. Even if the tapes were okay, Alvin was magic with a camera, and he'd capture images that would no doubt make Nate's finger swell up from making frantic calls.

His first step, though, was to see what he'd caught on camera, if only to see that he'd captured something. Not surprisingly, Greenleaf didn't have a VCR, but he'd seen one in the rare-book room, and as he drove along the quiet road that led toward town, he wondered how Lexie would behave toward him when he got there. Would she go back to being distant and professional? Would the good feelings from their day together linger? Or would she simply remember their final moments on the porch, when he'd pushed too hard? He had no idea what was going to happen, even though he'd devoted much of the night to trying to figure it out.

Sure, he'd found the source of the light. Like most mysteries, it wasn't that hard to solve if you knew what to look for, and a quick check of a Web site sponsored by NASA eliminated the only other possibility. The moon, he'd learned, couldn't have been responsible for the lights. It was, in fact, a new moon, when the moon was hidden by the earth's shadow, and he had a sneaking suspicion that the mysterious lights only occurred in this particular phase. It would make sense: without moonlight, even the faintest traces of other light would become that much more obvious, especially when reflected in the water droplets of the fog.

But as he'd stood in the chilly air with the answer within reach, all he could think about was Lexie. It seemed impossible that he'd only met her two days earlier. It made no sense. Of course, Einstein had postulated that time was relative, and he supposed that could explain it. How did the old saying about relativity go? A minute with a beautiful woman would pass in an instant, while a minute with your hand placed against a hot burner would feel like an eternity? Yeah, he thought, that was it. Or close, anyway.

He again regretted his behavior on the porch, wishing for the hundredth time that he had taken her hint when he'd been thinking about kissing her. She'd made her feelings obvious and he'd ignored them. The regular Jeremy would have forgotten all about it already, shrugging the whole thing off as inconsequential. For some reason, this time it wasn't so easy.

Though he'd dated a lot and hadn't exactly become a hermit after Maria had left him, he had seldom done the spend-the-whole-day-talking-with-someone thing. Usually, it was just dinner or drinks and enough flirtatious conversation to loosen the inhibitions before the good part. Part of him knew it was time to grow up when it came to dating, maybe even try to settle down and live the sort of life his brothers did. His brothers readily concurred, and so, of course, did their wives. They were of the widely shared opinion that he should get to know women before trying to sleep with them, and one had gone so far as to set him up on a date with a divorced neighbor who believed the same. Of course, she'd declined a second date, in large part because of the pass he'd made at her on the first. In the past few years, it just seemed easier to not get to know women too well, to keep them in the realm of perpetual strangers, when they could still project hope and potential on him.

And that was the thing. There wasn't hope or potential. At least, not for the sort of life his brothers and sisters-in-law believed in, or even, he suspected, the kind Lexie wanted. His divorce from Maria had proved that. Lexie was a small-town girl with small-town dreams, and it wouldn't be enough to be faithful and responsible and to have things in common. Most women wanted something else, a way of life he couldn't give them. Not because he didn't want to, not because he was enamored of the bachelor scene, but simply because it was impossible. Science could answer a lot of questions, science could solve a lot of problems, but it couldn't change his particular reality. And the reality was that Maria had left him because he hadn't been, nor ever could be, the kind of husband she'd wanted.

He admitted this painful truth to no one, of course. Not to his brothers, not to his parents, not to Lexie. And usually, even in quiet moments, not even to himself.

Though the library was open by the time he got there, Lexie wasn't in yet, and he felt a pang of disappointment when he pushed open the office door only to find the room empty. She'd been in earlier, though: the rare-book room had been left unlocked, and when he turned on the light, he saw a note on the desk, along with the topography maps he'd mentioned. The note took only an instant to read:

I'm taking care of some personal things. Feel free to use the VCR.

Lexie

No mention of yesterday or last night, no mention of wanting to make arrangements to see him again. Not even an acknowledgment above the signature. It wasn't exactly chilly as far as notes went, but it didn't leave him with the warm fuzzies, either.

Then again, he was probably reading too much into it. She might have been in a rush this morning, or she might have kept it short because she planned to be back soon. She did mention it was personal, and with women, that could mean anything from a doctor's appointment to shopping for a friend's birthday. There was just no way to tell.

And besides, he had work to do, he told himself. Nate was waiting and his career was on the line. Jeremy forced himself to focus on chasing the tail end of the story.

The audio recorders had picked up no unusual sounds, and neither the microwave nor the electromagnetic detector had registered the slightest energy variances. The videotapes, however, had picked up everything he'd seen the night before, and he watched the images half a dozen times from every different angle. The cameras with the special light-filtering capacity showed the glowing fog most vividly. Though the tapes might have been good enough to provide a small still to accompany his column, they were far from television quality. When viewed in real time, they had a sort of home-video feel to them, one that reminded him of cheesy tapes offered in proof of other supernatural events. He made a note to

purchase a real camera, no matter how much celery his editor would eat because of it.

But even if the tapes weren't of the quality he'd hoped they would be, observing the way in which the lights had changed during the twenty-two seconds they were visible assured him again that he'd indeed found the answer. He popped the tapes out, perused the topography maps, and calculated the distance from Riker's Hill to the river. He compared the earlier photographs he'd taken of the cemetery to photos of the cemetery he found in books about the town's history, and came up with what he assumed to be a fairly accurate estimate regarding the rate that the cemetery was sinking. Though he wasn't able to find any more information on the legend of Hettie Doubilet--the records from that period shed no light on the subject--he made a call to the state water bureau concerning the underground reservoir in this part of the state, and one to the department of mines, which had information on the quarries that had been dug earlier in the century. After that, he tapped a few words into a search engine of the Internet looking for the timetables he needed, and finally, after being put on hold for ten minutes, he spoke to a Mr. Larsen at the paper mill, who was eager to help in any way he could.

And with that, all the pieces had finally come together in a way that he could definitively prove.

The truth had been in front of everyone all along. Like most mysteries, the solution had been simple, and it made him wonder why no one had realized it before. Unless, of course, someone had, which opened the door to another angle on the story.

Nate, no doubt, would be thrilled, but despite the morning's success, Jeremy felt little sense of accomplishment. Instead, all he thought about was the fact that Lexie wasn't around to either congratulate or tease him about it. Honestly, he didn't care how she'd react as long as she was here to react, and he rose from his seat to check her office again.

For the most part, it looked the same as it had the day before. Stacks of documents were still piled on her desk, books were scattered haphazardly, and the screen saver on her computer was etching and erasing colorful drawings. The answering machine, flashing with messages, sat next to a small potted plant.

Still, he couldn't shake the feeling that without Lexie, the room may as well have been completely empty.

Twelve

My main man!" Alvin shouted into the receiver. "Life treating you good down south?"

Despite the static on Jeremy's cell phone, Alvin sounded remarkably chipper.

"I'm fine. I was calling to see if you'd still like to come on down and help me."

"I'm already gathering my gear," he answered, sounding out of breath. "Nate called me an hour ago and told me all about it. I'll meet you at Greenleaf later tonight--Nate made the reservation. But, anyway, my flight leaves in a couple of hours. And believe me, I can't wait. Another few days in this stuff, and I'll go crazy."

"What are you talking about?"

"Haven't you been reading the papers or watching the news?"

"Of course. I've yet to miss an issue of the Boone Creek Weekly."

"Huh?"

"Never mind," Jeremy said. "It's not important."

"Well, anyway, it's been an absolute blizzard since you left," Alvin informed him. "And I mean North Pole stuff, where even Rudolph's nose is worthless. Manhattan is practically buried. You got out of here just in time. Since you've left, this is the first day that flights are even close to being on schedule. I had to pull a few strings to even get the flight I did. How can you not know about this?"

As Alvin explained, Jeremy tapped his computer keys, calling up the Weather Channel on the Internet. On the national map, the Northeast was a blanket of white.

L-I-B, he thought. Who could have guessed?

"I guess I've been busy," he said.

"Hiding's more like it," Alvin said. "But I hope she's worth it."

"What are you talking about?"

"Don't bother pulling my chain. We're friends, remember? Nate's been in a panic because he can't reach you, you haven't been reading the papers, and you haven't been watching the news. We both know what that means. You always get like this when you meet someone new."

"Look, Alvin . . ."

"Is she pretty? I'll bet she's beautiful, right? You always strike gold. Makes me sick."

Jeremy hesitated before answering, then finally gave in. If Alvin was coming down, he'd learn soon enough, anyway.

"Yeah, she's pretty. But it's not what you think. We're just friends."

"I'm sure," he said, laughing. "But what you consider friends and what I consider friends are just a little different."

"Not this time," Jeremy said.

"Does she have a sister?" Alvin asked, ignoring the comment.

"No."

"But she has friends, right? And I'm not interested in the ugly one, remember . . ."

Jeremy felt his headache coming on again, and his tone took on an edge. "I'm not in the mood for this, okay?"

Alvin paused on the other end. "Hey, what's going on here?" he asked. "I'm just joking around."

"Some of your jokes aren't funny."

"You like her, don't you? I mean, you like her a lot."

"I told you that we're just friends."

"I can't believe this. You're falling in love."

"No," Jeremy said.

"Hey, pal, I know you, so don't try to deny it. And I think that's great. Weird but great. But unfortunately, I have to cut this short if I'm going to catch my flight. Traffic is miserable, as you can probably imagine. But I can't wait to see the woman who finally tamed you."

"She didn't tame me," Jeremy protested. "Why aren't you listening to me?"

"I am listening," he said. "I just hear the things you're not saying."

"Yeah, whatever. When will you be here?"

"I'm guessing around seven tonight. I'll see you then. And, by the way, say hello from me, okay? Tell her I'm dying to meet her and her friend . . ."

Jeremy ended the call before Alvin had a chance to finish, and, as if to underscore the point, he shoved his phone back into his pocket.

No wonder he'd been keeping it turned off. It must have been a subconscious decision, one based on the fact that both his friends had a tendency to be irritating at times. First, there was Nate the Energizer Bunny and his never-ending search for fame. And now this.

Alvin didn't have a clue as to what he was talking about. They may have been friends, they may have spent a lot of Friday nights staring at women over beers, they may have talked about life for hours, and deep down, Alvin may have honestly believed that he was right. But he wasn't, simply because he couldn't be.

The facts, after all, spoke for themselves. For one thing, Jeremy hadn't loved a woman in years, and though it had been a long time, he could still remember how he'd felt back then. He was certain that he would have recognized the feeling again, and frankly, he didn't. And in light of the fact that he'd just met the woman, the whole idea seemed preposterous. Even his highly emotional Italian mother didn't believe that true love could blossom overnight. Like his brothers and sisters-in-law, she wanted nothing more for him than to marry and start a family, but if he showed up at her doorstep and said that he'd met someone two days ago and knew she was the one for him, his mother would smack him with a broom, curse in Italian, and drag him to church, sure that he had some serious sins that needed confessing.

His mother knew men. She'd married one, raised six boys, and was sure she'd seen it all. She knew exactly how men tended to think when it came to women, and although she relied on common sense instead of science, she was completely accurate in her judgment that love wasn't possible in just a couple of days. Love could be set in motion quickly, but true love needed time to grow into something strong and enduring. Love was, above all, about commitment and dedication and a belief that spending years with a certain person would create something greater than the sum of what the two could accomplish separately. Only time, however, could show whether you'd been accurate in your judgment.

Lust, meanwhile, cou

ld happen almost instantly, and that's why his mother would have smacked him. To her, the description of lust was simple: two people learn they're compatible, attraction grows, and the ancient instinct to preserve the species kicks in. All of which meant that while lust was a possibility, he couldn't love Lexie.

So there it was. Case closed. Alvin was wrong, Jeremy was right, and once again, the truth had set him free.

He smiled with satisfaction for a moment before his brow began to wrinkle.

And yet . . .

Well, the thing was, it didn't quite feel like lust, either. Not this morning, anyway. Because even more than wanting to hold her or kiss her, he simply ached to see her again. To spend time with her. To talk to her. He wanted to watch her roll her eyes when he said something ridiculous, he wanted to feel her hand on his arm like the day before. He wanted to watch her nervously tuck strands of hair behind her ear, and listen as she told him about her childhood. He wanted to ask her about her dreams and hopes for the future, to know her secrets.

But that wasn't the strange part. The strange part was that he couldn't perceive an ulterior motive for his impulses. Granted, he wouldn't say no if she wanted to sleep with him, but even if she didn't, just spending time with her would be enough for now.

Deep down, he simply lacked an ulterior motive. He'd already made the decision that he would never again put Lexie in the position he had the night before. It had taken a lot of courage, he thought, to say what she had. More courage than he had. After all, in the two days they'd seen each other, he hadn't even been able to tell her that he'd been married before.

But if it couldn't be love and it didn't feel like lust, what was it? Like? Did he like her? Of course, he did, but that word didn't quite capture his feelings, either. It was a little too . . . vague and soft around the edges. People liked ice cream. People liked to watch television. It meant nothing, and it didn't come close to explaining why, for the first time, he felt the urge to tell someone else the truth about his divorce. His brothers didn't know the truth, nor did his parents. But, for whatever reason, he couldn't shake the realization that he wanted Lexie to know; and right now she was nowhere to be found.